This is my first quadcopter and I couldn't be happier. It is easy to learn, flies very well and handles crashes better than expected. There have been a few worrisome moments after I have had to dump her because of signal loss or threat of losing it. It doesn't handle wind very well, but I cannot imagine most drones in this price range do. The "HD" camera is a bit of a stretch, more of a novelty than anything. Videos are dominated by rotor sound, though i prefer the movies over still shots, which rarely come out well due to focus and stability issues. That being said, I would rather have the option of a camera than not (and i find myself flying without it frequently). For those of you complaining of hover problems, I do not have the same issue. Though I am constantly recalibrating the drone (both sticks bottom right on a level surface) and i take a toothbrush to the motor gears to remove dirt and grit that cause issues. I find that once my copter is about 3 feet off the ground and clear of rotor wash, it hovers like a dream. If you're looking for an entry drone, I highly recommend the Explorer 2!

The X5SC is almost the same as the X5C1, but it has a better pinion gear system; however, it cannot be replaced as easily as the X5C1 can be. The rumors of the X5SC not being able to fly as well in the wind are true. I have experienced this problem. It seems the maximum angle of attack is much less in this model. Flying the SC in High mode is like flying the C1 in Low mode. You just can't battle the wind so it's better as an indoor or calm day flyer. I solved the problem by replacing the SC board with a regular C1 board. Now I have the maneuverability of the C1. Things I like: the pinion gears have covers to protect them; the battery compartment is bigger so higher mah batteries fit easily; the landing legs are longer; and it is easier to take apart and put back together. The motors are the same coreless type, but are bigger and measure 8.5mm x 16mm. I had one burn out and replaced it with a 7mm x 20mm by wrapping some electrical tape around it to make it fit. It worked fine for short-term, but it won't dissipate heat as well.

I'm new to the drone game and read that this was a good place to get in some practice. The drone is very light and weighs under 255 grams, as a result, it does not need to be registered with the FAA (per the new FAA drone law). I got this mainly so that my kids and I could do something different on the weekends. We've now flown it around an hours worth of time. The battery only last between 10-15 minutes, so I had to buy spares and keep them at the ready. Maneuverability was a bit of a challenge for me, but my 10 year old picked it up pretty quickly. (she claims that all her minecraft knowledge, was to blame)... whatever. One thing to note, the manual is pretty bad and figuring out how to get it to start was a bit of a challenge at first. We finally you tubed it and figured out that you have to do the following: 1 - Power up the drone 2 - Power up the remote controller 3 - push the left controller stick all the way up... then all the way down. Step number 3 is essential or it will not do a thing. Once this is done, you can begin flying and crashing about. We've crashed into trees and other "soft" objects and have yet to cause any real damage. Hopefully that trend continues and we can have fun for a good while with it. I got it during the Black Friday for a great price and if it happens to break, I won't be too hear broken. Until then, happy flying!

I like this quad. It's stable, responsive and flies well. I was worried about the so-called "Wind bug", where the quad will not fly into wind, even a slight breeze (~1mph), but flying it tonight has reassured me. I have flown it in some stiff winds (up to 10mph gusts) and had no problem pitching into the wind. Naturally, wind affects this quad more than most, as it's small and very light, so it gets buffeted around, but you can easily fly it outside in wind. I like the styling. It's a mini-Phantom! The white color looks great, it's a slightly metallic white, and it's easy to see night or day. I'd say it's about a 200mm-class quad.It comes with screw-on prop guards and landing gear, as well as a clip-on camera. Which leads me to the worse part of the quad: The camera. It's terrible in low light and OK in bright sunlight. It's also angled down far too much, which means you need to have altitude to film things, and when you fly forward, it will film the ground. It's also very light though, so it will not affect flight times much to have it on. The quad gave me about 7 minutes of flight time from the 3.7v 500mAh battery with prop guards, camera and landing gear attached. My Ready-to-Fly quad shipped with: The quad itself transmitter 3.7v 500mAh battery 4gb MicroSD memory card 2MP camera unit four spare rotors a small screw driver USB charger (don't use this, it's terrible and may kill your battery) USB card reader I can easily recommend this quad. It's well behaved, stable, and includes, however cheap, a camera and everything you need to fly out of the box.It's good for novices and more seasoned quad flyers alike! For reference, I have been flying quads for six months, but have been crashing helis for a lot longer. Quads I own, in no particular order: Dromida Ominus Two Hubsan X4 H107Ls Toys R Us Hornet Striker (rebrand Syma X4) WLToys V303 Airhogs Helix X4 SkyViper Camera Drone Eachine X6 Hexrotor And now the Syma X5SC!

Pros: Lightweight - Doesn't require FAA registration here in the US. Camera takes very good photos - Not professional quality for business, but good enough for personal. Cons: Because it's lightweight, flying in windy situations is tough. You have to put it in High mode and really use your controls to maintain control. Batteries - They do not last long. 5 minutes is typical. Recommend buying several backups. Still a great copter for my kids. They love flying around the house..... yes... even indoors!

This is a great little drone for the price. I've had mine about 3 days and flown it about 15 times.. Its very stable and easy to control. Its a smooth flier. This was my first quadcopter. I would suggest buying a few extra batteries when you order because with the video camera your flight times are only around 6 minutes or so. I've crashed a few times and no damage. The only reason I am giving it 4 stars instead of 5 is the props on mine hit the prop guards when installed. I don't know if they were made too small or what the issue was but with them on the props hit the guards. The video quality is great as well as the photo quality. I would highly recommend the Syma brand to new fliers. If it flies out of range the motors die. if you can get to it before it hits the ground you can save it from a hard crash. I've already ordered a second one.

I've had a few small drones that were similar. The Syma X5SC is easy to trim and generally easy to fly. A good learning quad. Flight time is reasonable (maybe 5-6 minutes fully loaded) and the legs/prop-protectors are nice. That written, the camera is poor (not terrible be definitely not good). I believe it is a 2MP camera but I had another smaller drone that also advertised itself as "HD" and it really was HD. This is definitely not HD with the X5SC (though they call it "enhanced"). File size gives it away. A still image is about a 200-250kb file size whereas another drone I had produced a pretty consistent 550kb file... and video files aren't nearly as large as a better HD drone. I think this one shoots video at about 2mb/second and one really needs to be at 2.5mb/second to start to look sharp. The manual is just OK (with the typical goofy Chinese translations to English) but it's adequate. So, all in all, it's a good drone for flying. Outside, for distant views, I suppose the resolution is OK.

1/4/16 I think this is a great drone, and its relatively easy to fly. I think that with practice, there is no need for the bumpers, and the camera is not amazing, but good enough to enjoy views. The only reason it got 4 stars from me is because I was unable to view video footage.I tried on a Mac and on a Windows PC and neither allowed me to view the videos. The pictures worked fine. I just wish I could view the videos. Thank you Syma for another great product! 1/11/16 Sadly today, I ended up flying my drone into a tree. It got caught in the branches at around 100ft. Normally I would take the blame, but not this time. The drone lost control at that height, and did not respond to the signal. I am hoping that it will fall down somehow, but I am disappointed with the loss of connection. Syma is still a reliable company, but I do not suggest taking this drone above 85ft.

This X5SC aircraft worked well right out of the box . I have not had the "wind" problem as described by others yet However the headless mode can sometimes get confused and needs to be recalibrated by holding both sticks back and toward the left. A minor inconvenience. Removing the camera and prop guards does smarten up the aircrafts performance quite a bit. Battery time is about the same as the X5C but you do get a decent warning of flashing lights in time to land before the model self aborts, .unlike the X5C that only tells you when its about to crash. You can put much larger batteries in this version and increase flying time but I would not fly too long at one time as the motors do get very warm.

I can't rate this as five stars due to it having some sort of design problem that affects its flight in even the slightest breeze. It seems to be a problem with its stabilization programming -- if you try to fly it into a headwind, it acts like it's trying to correct an imbalance, and slowly stops flying forward, levels out, and you find you're gaining altitude instead. In the wrong circumstances with an inexperienced pilot, this could easily lead to loss of the quadcopter. I recommend the earlier model X5C instead -- it's the best little quadcopter I've ever flown.

Can't go wrong here for the price as a beginner quad. The headless mode makes it a little easier to bring home when you get disoriented (you will sooner or later, promise!) I have compared this side by side with the x5-c upgraded but non headless model and find this is a little easier from a beginner stand point because it seems a tad less aggressive on the throttle. That being said, they are both more durable than they feel and have survived 50+ foot drops to the ground and rode out a few storms up in the oak trees till the wind brought them back down. 3-4 months into it and they still fly great, awesome for the kids too. Keeps them busy when I pull out the dji phantom that I've since upgraded to because of how much fun I had with this. The video is ok quality for this price point! Don't expect great video until you are rocking a real gimble and camera stabilizers. But you will get some fun shots in and views you can't fathom came from a $50 toy! Battery life is a bummer so do yourself a favor and spring for the extra 5 batteries and charger that can do them all at the same time. It's worth it as the 6-8 minutes of fun end quickly. I usually run with no prop guards and no camera for extended battery life.

Just getting around to trying out my first quad copter drone which I got for a white elephant party for Christmas. As it turns out I purchased it for the event and ended up getting it. Pays to get something that you would give yourself. What do you get for about $50? A fun drone to get your feet wet in the world of drones with that won't break the bank if this hobby is not for you. It may wet your appetite for something bigger and better. What was in my box: - drone body - 8 propellers - 4 prop guards - 4 legs - small Phillips screwdriver to screw the legs and prop guards on with and remove/replace controller battery compartment door - micro SD card to USB adapter to allow you to read your SD card with a USB port on your laptop or computer - 500mAh LiPo battery - charging cable (USB to battery connector), dim LED light on USB end of cable lights while charging, turns off when complete - camera which is removable - 4GB micro SD card - controller with small LCD display which only displays some drone settings, not video or pictures or anything like that - instructions which are pretty poorly written and made me laugh a few times, you will be scratching your head a few times reading this What you need to supply: - 4 AA alkaline batteries for the controller - patience to learn to fly if this is your first drone experience What is optional/recommended: - highly recommend spare batteries which are very cheap, I got five 720mAh batteries with a 5 port charger for abut $20 (they work but long term quality of these is to be determined). With the provided 500mAh battery, the run time for me with everything attached and taking video was about 5 or 6 minutes. With the 720mAh batteries about 8 or 9 minutes.

Have assembled. Went well, screws have to be really tightened with the small handled screwdriver to pull up tight. Red light comes on charge cord when only plugged into battery. Doesn't seem right, but works correctly when hooked up to charger. On charging, off when fully charged. Takes a couple of hours. Flies a good while on a 500 mah battery charge, haven't timed it. Ordered some 850 mah batteries at the same time, and they have extended flying time over the original of course. Have only flown it indoors without the camera. Flies very well and stable. Much easier to fly than my first drone the Proto-X. Controls are sluggish, figured it must have a faster rate, but appears not to from what I find in the manual. No problem for me, but can see where maybe not enough control to fight a strong wind outside. We will see. You must follow the correct sequence to sync transmitter and drone. Blows an amazing amount of air. The lights seem backwards, seems reddish would be in the rear like tail lights but green are. Thought just swapping lens covers would correct, but no, LEDs are colored too. I like it just fine so far. Order extra batteries and maybe a faster charger. Update: Lowered to 4 stars. Flew outside for the first time today as winds were very light for OK (approx. 5 mph). Had gear and guards on, no camera. The "Wind Bug" another reviewer spoke of is certainly there. Have flown RC airplanes for many years so not a newbie to RC flying. Not enough control even on High Rate to fight against even this light breeze. Acted like a kite. Controlling against the wind it would continue to climb while cutting throttle. Cutting throttle would not do much to lower altitude but would allow the wind to carry it away even faster. It was about to go out of site so I cut throttle all the way. Don't know if it was out of range or not but it managed to land in some short grass with no damage whatsoever.Its great indoors, but to fly out side will have to wait for the very rare totally calm day here in OK. Would not get another model for this reason. Labeled with name and phone number in case. Update: As of July 2017 this quad is still going. Took the prop guards off and it flies so much better in the wind.

Bought 3 of these over the last month. Two blue ones were perfect. One white one had a bad motor. This one was the replacement and required quite a bit of trimming out compared to the others. You can tell one motor isn't getting full rpms compare to other three and blade stops while others keep spinning when throttle was cut. Plan on replacing motors as soon as it can't be trimmed out proper on transmitter. Great little toy for grandkids when working properly.